Mumbai versus Delhi

The Mumbai Indians and Delhi Daredevils will meet for their IPL match today. While the fate of this match is yet unknown and odds are in favour of Delhi, there is another front on which Delhi has already beaten Mumbai and that too with a shamefully big margin. The front I am talking about is the voting percentage of the 2 cities. While Mumbai set a target of just a measly 41% even after the huge hoophulla, Delhi managed to beat the target by posting a cool 53%. This is supposedly Delhi’s highest voting percentage in the past 20 years and ahead of other Indian metros like Mumbai and Bangalore.

Though am a Mumbaikar, I am no stranger to Delhi too. With almost 90% of my relatives residing in Delhi, my yearly trips to Delhi have made me fairly accustomed to the manners of Delhietes. Right from my childhood I was always a part of the Mumbai versus Delhi fight between me and my cousins and vociferously defended Mumbai and launched offensive attacks at Delhi. I took great pride in the independence and opportunities I enjoy in Mumbai, the great public transport and the spiritful Mumbaikars am surrounded with. Though often I had to cut corners while comparing the 2 cities on grounds of cleanliness, good roads etc, I managed to come out triumphantly from the debate by using my trump card of ‘the great Mumbai spirit’.

But no longer can I do that. Like the failing public transportation, increasing crime against women, poor infrastructure hammered every year by the feisty Mumbai rains, the great Mumbai spirit also looks on its way downhill. I often accused Delhiwallas to be arrogant and brash, always picking up a fight and Mumbaikars as ever accommodating always ready to adjust. Sadly, now my interpretation of these behavioural aspects has started to change. The Mumbai spirit has made us complacent, live with this chalta hai attitude, not striving to bring changes in our crumpling society while the brash Delhietes have gone ahead and raised their voices and brought about changes like the meticulous Delhi Metro, clean and wide Delhi roads. It may have its share of vices like the high crime rate against women, bad traffic sense among people, non systematic way of doing things in almost everything but still it has managed to brought about a change for the better.

And though am still a proud Mumbaikar and can write down a 100 things in which we fare better than the Delhiwallas , I admit that we have lagged behind in that killer instinct of changing things for better. As far as the improvement parameter, am ashamed that Delhi has managed to beat us.

The White Elephants of Uttar Pradesh

Wikipedia describes a white elephant as a valuable possession which its owner cannot dispose and whose cost (particularly cost of upkeep) is out of proportion to its usefulness. In financial terms, maintaining a white elephant is just a cost centre which will never incur any revenue. And in political terms, it means running the current government in Uttar Pradesh by Mayawati.

Our dear Behenji is on a memorial inauguration spree in Lucknow. Even though there is a PIL filed by a lawyer against the alleged misuse of UP government funds on the memorials, 15 memorials were inaugurated last week so that a Supreme Court order would not be able to spoil the Memorial party. I read in article that as per the Lucknow Development Authority, the statues of Mayawati and Kanshi Ram at various places in Lucknow cost an enormous Rs 6.68 crore and marble elephants at Ambedkar Memorial cost Rs 52 crore. Also, an amount of Rs 90 crore was allocated for the beautification of Kanshi Ram Park. I won't be surprised if UP will soon borrow the title 'Land of Elephants' from Thailand or rather it will be the 'Land of White elephants'. For those who came in late, elephant is the symbol of Mayawati's party, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).

So acute is the egocentric behaviour of Mayawati that she has reportedly pulled down as her statue at a public place as it appears dwarfed by the figure of her political mentor, Kanshi Ram standing alongside. And now she intends to reconstruct it again. So we are basically doling out huge amounts of tax money for feeding the egos of our boisterous politicians. Mayawati argues that Congress has spent a lot of money building roads and memorials after the Gandhis and Nehrus, so why are they making an issue when the poor Dalit wants to do the same? So while the Congress and BSP engage in an competition to dump our nation with gigantic white elephants we can just pay for their maintenance.